Your answers to these and other questions will help you determine whether or not Starbucks is truly an Experience Stager who happens to sell coffee, or a Seller of Coffee that is attempting to stage experiences.

Like many other things...Experiences are in the eye of the beholder! What do you think?

September 21, 2006

First it was MySpace...now, it seems that another gathering place for the young and funded may be for sale. The linked article indicates that FaceBook may be purchased by Yahoo! for a sum nearing the $1 Billion mark. Who's next?

September 20, 2006

Today's Notable Quote: "I yam what I yam, and that's all that I yam..." America's #1 Spinach spokesman, cartoon character Popeye the Sailor.

Don't eat raw or lightly processed foods when you cannot verify the source and are confident in the safety of the product. Don't eat raw or undercooked chicken or ground meat. Learn proper handwashing techniques and use them whenever preparing, storing or serving food.

If you are a food preparer and/or server, be aware that as many as 1 in 5 of your customers may have compromised immune systems--rendering them particularly vulnerable to serious illness if they consume foods containing pathogens.

The old sailor is probably cutting back on his spinach consumption in light of the recent flood of negative press on the green stuff. I wonder if broccoli would give him the chutzpah needed to take on Bluto?

September 09, 2006

Today's Notable Quote: "Not that Wal-Mart the company is hurt very much by food poisoning lawsuits." - Brian White, for Blogging Stocks

Ensuring a safe food supply for Americans is a shared responsibility between growers, manufacturers, wholesale distributors, retailers and consumers.

Each year, according to the CDC, 70 million Americans become sick from something they have eaten that was produced, stored or served in an unsafe manner. Some 325,000 visit the hospital due to the extent of their illness, with 5,000 leaving in a hearse.

Food safety is not something to be taken lightly. Today's link is to an article from yesterday's Greenwood Indiana newspaper. The story reports that a young boy became ill (and had to be hospitalized) with Salmonellosis as the result of eating a ham and cheese sandwich. Read on for more...

Foodborne pathogens may be present in food without any "tell-tale" signs, such as odor, color or taste. Just because something "looks and smells o.k." doesn't guarantee that it's safe to eat. Only proper attention to cleanliness and temperature control during the manufacturing, storing and serving of food can ensure safe delivery to the consumer.

Warhol, a man known for his numerous quotes regarding everyone getting "15 minutes of fame", sounds rather cynical in this quote that could be aimed squarely at the towering web tandems My Space and You Tube. Both have become incredibly popular--so popular, in fact, that numerous articles are written about each on a daily basis. Take a look at one of the latest from the Wall Street Journal, which details the number of videos posted, stored and viewed on You Tube... If the data from YouTube are to believed, the world has a lot of explaining to do.